Living close to family has its ups and downs. After being away for half of a decade we were looking forward to being around family again. I’ve got to say: it’s mostly “ups.” One of the things that’s been ups is watching our son grow in what he wants to eat. Just yesterday he started eating spinach (really demanding it) in preference over meat, potatoes, peanut butter, etc. — you name it! Truly something amazing. His aunt has him on cheese. His grandmothers both have him on ice (something we don’t do much of at home). All around he is sort of expanding his food vocabulary. Sometimes, though, this comes at a price.
The heavy price to pay is that our son now prefers to eat some foods over others. Early one morning we were having breakfast: eggs. Our eggs are more like wonderful omelettes. There was a problem though, and it wasn’t the eggs. It was the strawberries and chocolate we had sitting on a counter-top elsewhere. Our nutritious breakfast now, in our sons eyes, dulled in comparison to the fruit and cacao that sat uneaten elsewhere. This situation required an ultimatum: eat the eggs and you can have some of the “forbidden” fruits on the counter-top. He tried to resist. He tried to scream. He tried to plead his case with everything from body language, grunts, to rudimentary English… but to no avail. His parents wouldn’t budge. So he ate some eggs… and enjoyed them. Then he ate more eggs. He forgot about the “forbidden” fruits until after he’d finished his meal. Then, and only then, did he partake in the other food, happily. As a child, he learned a valuable lesson: food can be good, even if it isn’t strawberries and chocolate. As parents we also learned a lesson: he’ll come around eventually. Be firm. A great lesson learned by all.